Keep Your 2010 Resolutions Simple

As we start the New Year there is usually excitement, optimism and renewal in the air. Some people set very loft resolutions and goals, others don’t do any goal setting, some aren’t goal setters, period and then there are those like myself who are continually setting goals thus setting “New Year’s Resolutions” is relatively meaningless.

I want you to be successful in the goals that you set. The trick is to set goals that are achievable and then keep building or adding on to those goals. In short – take lots of baby steps that will allow you to achieve your bigger picture goal. Way too many business owners don’t do any planning or goal setting because it then becomes this heavy weight that they are unable to execute on (or don’t know how to execute).

The secret is K.I.S. – Keep It Simple. Try breaking your goal down into small weekly bite size pieces. Just focus on one part of your goal each week. An example many can relate to – if your goal is to lose a certain amount of weight, during one week just focus on cutting out soda drinks. Add water and tea to your diet. That is it. In the following week you can add or change something else in your diet that will help you achieve your goal.

From a business perspective you might have a goal that says you want to implement and execute a marketing plan. Great, break it down – one week focus on defining the elements of the marketing plan, the following week focus on completing certain sections of the marketing plan and so on until the plan is complete. From an execution perspective, again start simple. If your marketing plan includes social media – start simple. For a week or maybe a month, focus on making Twitter part of your regular marketing activities. Then add another component of your social media plan. Start slowly adding in various components of your marketing plan until performing marketing activities becomes part of your company behavior/culture. When the year comes to an end you will have achieved your goal!

Make sure that you include others in helping you achieve your goals. Having people there to help and support you will make it that much easier to accomplish your 2010 resolutions. And don’t forget to celebrate your victories along the way! There is no need to wait until the end of the year to acknowledge that you got things done! For every baby step you complete, do some sort of celebration. This can be a little personal thing you do for yourself or something bigger that you share with team members.

I wish you well on your journey in 2010. You have the potential for greatness in you! Go for it! Start small. Make a promise and keep it.

Get Planning, Get Buzzing

Most small business owners typically dread business planning, not just annual planning but the ongoing planning meetings and activities that it takes to make sure that you actually execute on your plan. This is a personal challenge for me.

As a small business owner myself, I know that when I plan, execute to the plan and update the plan great things happen. I have several clients, small business owners, who are deeply entrenched in planning; so much so that if it isn’t currently part of their culture, it is quickly becoming part of the culture. These business owners and their employees are seeing the results of planning in all areas of the organization.

Their offices are “buzzing”. People are on the same page, all moving in the same direction, toward the same goals. They are, dare I say it, motivated and excited! They face the same economic challenges as the rest of us but everyone from the business owner down is focused on what needs to be done to move the business forward.

I won’t hesitate to tell you that these are also the businesses that are seeing the greatest successes! These organizations have taken the leap of faith and committed to crystallizing where they want to go, by when and how they will get there. Are there bumps along the way? Of course, but because they have well thought out plans they can make adjustments as needed.

They don’t have all of the answers (and they don’t need all of the answers) but they have a solid game plan, are executing, and continually reviewing where they are compared to where they are supposed to be.

Seeing the tremendous results being achieved by these small businesses is a great thrill for me. My goal is to get Main Street healthy and these companies are wonderful examples. As we are nearing the end of 2009, invest the time and at least get your strategic planning process started. It will be worth it!

Anticipate the Best, Prepare for the Worst

Editor-in-Chief Robert Levin discusses business planning during uncertain times.

By: Robert S. Levin

Fall is an interesting time of the year. We’ve got one eye on finishing the current year strong, and the other on planning for the next year. When it comes to planning for next year, there is good reason to start early, but the reality is that most of us will want to procrastinate planning more than we have in years past.

This is totally understandable, because while the marketplace has settled down a bit, the state of the economy has caused us to say, “I have no idea what is going to happen next year.” But that doesn’t mean that we should not plan. In fact, it means that a plan for 2010 is even more important than it has been over the past few years.

Without a well-thought-out plan, we will not be in a position to react if business picks up or slows down considerably. So, how do you plan in time of uncertainty? Here are a few of the things that we are doing at NY Report, as well as what other business owners have told me they are trying:

Create projections for the worst-case, expected, and best-case scenarios. In the past, I just created one set of projections; however, this year I will create three, because the degree of uncertainty is much higher. The projections include plans for cutting back on certain expenses if we get into the worst case, and increasing investment in the best case.

Plan to utilize freelancers for new projects. You pay a premium for freelancers, but if things aren’t going well, freelancers are easier to cut than employees.

Examine cash flow (not just profits) when considering new products and services. Two reasons for this: 1) customers are paying slower, and 2) access to credit might not be there when you need it.

Remember that in every market there is opportunity. So this year, I am paying even more attention to how my industry is changing and how we need to evolve in order to capitalize on these changes.

If, after reading this, you are still thinking “Everything is really up in the air and planning is just a crapshoot,” you might have a point. But by giving careful consideration to these ideas, you will increase your odds of success significantly. We cannot let uncertainty prevent us from taking advantage of opportunities, nor can we be oblivious to threats.

Here’s How to Generate Buzz and Increase your Customer Acquisitions in Five Easy Steps

If you’re like most organizations, the sales team is on your back. Or you are part of the sales team. They—or you—need more customers. You feel like you are being stretched in 10 different directions. On top of everything, your budget just got slashed and your team is dwindling.

Here is a straight forward marketing methodology designed to increase customer acquisition quickly while minimizing the cost. The great thing about this system is that it is a system. It really isn’t voodoo rocket science but sometimes common sense approaches are overlooked in favor of the latest quick fix elixir. Don’t undervalue this system because I know it works.

Here’s the Five Step Process

1. Understanding Your Customer
In this all-important first step your goal is understanding. To persuade someone, to motivate someone, to sell someone something, you really need to understand that person and their point of view. You need to begin to understand the people you are trying to communicate with by creating a profile that will help you gain a “feeling” for them.

2. Defining the Offer
Now, you must communicate the features and benefits of your product or service to the customers. Most people overdo the feature part instead of emphasizing the benefits. Remember, people do not buy things for what they are; they buy things for what they do for them. How the offer is delivered is part of the system. A dedicated area on your website can be created to describe the offer. The offer can be a quick tour of your product/service, a web event or webinar, white paper, special pricing or information. These components are relatively inexpensive to produce and can be leveraged in a variety of ways.

3. Setting Up the Processes
This is the nuts and bolts phase of the system. When a prospect registers to attend an event or receive one of your offers, they are entered into the sales cycle. It is very important that a system be put in place to capture the prospect’s contact information and to understand their level of qualification and buying interest. The more information you can gather, the better targeted a marketer you can be. The system can be a complex database or a simple word document—most importantly it should be a system that works easily for you.

4. Go to Market Plan
Here is the heart and soul of the program. It is where the rubber meets the road. Once you understand your customer, have a good offer and processes in place, you must develop a plan. The plan includes the strategies and various tactics targeted to the appropriate audience. Among the most effective marketing tools available today are direct mail, email, newsletters, websites, blogs and message boards, collateral, user conferences, partnership marketing, and public relations. Don’t forget social media such as Twitter, LinkedIn, FaceBook, etc. While there aren’t statistics yet on their “effectiveness” they are an important component of your marketing efforts. You must plan those tactics to work together as a campaign and then implement, implement, implement.

5. Measuring Marketing Results, Increasing Sales
Tracking your lead generation campaigns and seeing the results for yourself is the real power of this methodology. You’re building a bridge between your marketing campaigns and your sales efforts. You have a system set up with your processes, but the real trick is to analyze and measure the results to see what works and doesn’t work and then only repeat the successes.

Understanding Your Competitive Landscape

If you were a customer, would you choose your product over those offered by your competitors? Not sure how your products stack up against the others? Then you need a competitive landscape. Many companies think they know what their competition is up to, but they only take a close look once per year, or they only do serious research when they get into “feature wars” (what they have vs. what we have).

Understanding your competitors – which means any organization that offers the same, similar, or substitutable products or services in the business area you operate — is a fact of life. Successful companies conduct ongoing competitive research that shows them the big picture – why they win or lose deals, where the strengths and weaknesses are, where the next milestone on the roadmap is.

If you don’t have competitors, it is likely that you are in a radically new market (and competitors are likely to follow) or you are in a market so unattractive that nobody else wants to play.

However, if you are like most companies, you have some generalized awareness of who offers similar products. And that generalized awareness is not enough to leapfrog ahead into sustained growth.

What is a competitive landscape?
A competitive landscape (also known as “competitive intelligence”) provides cohesive, detailed information on what your competitors are doing including

• Who your real competitors are
• What their products are
• How your customers perceive the competition
• What your competitors’ business model is

You and your company need this vital information to plan and market profitable products that beat the competition. According to the Society of Competitive Intelligence Profession, a competitive landscape is a necessary business discipline for effective decision-making. The information enables management to make informed decisions about everything from marketing, R&D, and investing tactics to long-term business strategies. In short, a competitive landscape provides actionable intelligence that will provide a competitive edge.

Why do you need one?
Does a competitive landscape really make a difference? Yes! Studies show that companies that have active competitive intelligence programs generally outperform those that do not in sales, market share, and earnings per share. These studies suggest “there is a positive relationship between emphasis on competitive intelligence and successful financial performance.”

How do you create one?
First, get organized. In gathering competitive intelligence and creating your competitive landscape, you will gather a significant amount of information over time. You’ll need to create a file for each competitor, as being able to stay organized is critical.

Next, you need to know a variety of things about your competitors. At a minimum, you need to know

What makes your competitors the choice of some of your customers?

• Is it their overall perception of value for money?
• Quality?
• Price?
• The way they do business?

What, in the eyes of your customers, differentiates “them” from “you”?

What do their financials look like? How do your competitors make money and profits?

• Do they make their profits from having created better products and services?
• Have they established excellent financial deals with their suppliers?
• How much cash do they have?
• Can they react to impacts that you might make in the marketplace?
• If they are private, how much funding have they raised to date? When was it raised?

What are their future intentions? This is not an easy question to answer, but it should be one of the most important questions that you try to answer.

• In the next three years, which segments will your competitors be targeting?
• Could they be acquired or are they looking to acquire?
• What could they do in order to achieve growth?

Where do you get all this information?
Need information on a private company? Think you can’t get the information? Many think that because a company is privately held there is no information available. That is a myth. The information is out there, sometimes in the most unlikely places. Here are a few ideas for finding information – on both public and private companies – ethically:

1. Analyze competitors’ websites
2. Attend trade shows, exhibits and conferences
3. Talk to receptionists, salespeople and people in human resources in your competitors’ companies.
4. Check out local news outlets
5. Review 10-Ks, 10-Qs, annual reports and credit reports
6. Collect press releases
7. Read general business publications (Forbes, Wall Street Journal, Economist, etc.) and trade magazines
8. Listen and talk to industry analysts
9. Talk to vendors, partners and customers
10. Use on-line information service (e.g. Hoover’s Online, Dialog, and LexisNexis). This includes following blogs, message boards, Twitter, LinkedIn, FaceBook, and other social media.
11. Buy your competitors products
12. Use third party services (e.g. BEK Enterprises)
    

How Much Should You Invest?
Unfortunately, the answer to that question is an unsatisfying, “it depends.” The amount of time and money you need to spend in competitive research depends on your purpose.

If you are entering new markets, targeting new customers, looking to acquire or merge with another company, the time and effort is significantly greater than if you are creating a feature/benefit matrix. I often hear the cry, “it’s costs too much.” But the real question is: “Compared to what?”

If your competitors are consistently beating you, how much revenue have you lost? How expensive is it to send a sales rep to the client, and then lose the deal? How much have easily-avoided strategic and tactical mistakes cost your company over the past 12-24 months? If you could step around those mistakes and shut out your competition, what would that be worth?

Quality information is the basic component to making solid decisions, but it isn’t free. The public library is good, but it doesn’t cover all the bases, and even the best of business libraries have a limited amount of information. You need to plan to invest money and time to flesh out all the details in your landscape.

How long will it take?
Competitive analysis is an ongoing process – a discipline, if you will – rather than a once-a-year or ad hoc occurrence. Some companies have entire teams dedicated to the gathering of competitive intelligence.

However, if you don’t have the resources to dedicate to tracking your competition on a daily basis, don’t worry. Depending on your market, it is possible to successfully monitor your competition and use the information in decision making if you update your competitive information on a less frequent basis. Many companies do thorough updates on a monthly or quarterly basis.

The Bottom line
Acquiring competitive information is not easy, and turning raw data into a meaningful picture of your competition is an ongoing process. However, you can take solace in the fact that your competitors have the same challenges as you. If you have a better view of the competitive landscape, you can beat them at the game and see the difference that it makes on your bottom line!

Vision Statements vs. Mission Statements

A couple of weeks ago I was with a group of executive coaches and facilitators who are part of The Alternative Board (TAB) from the U.S., CN, the UK and Venezuela. We were talking about Company Vision Statements and it became clear to us that there was a lot of confusion amongst business owners regarding Company Vision Statements and Mission Statements. So, here is a definition of a Vision Statement, a Mission Statement and what should go into a Vision Statement.

A Company Vision Statement provides the destination on the roadmap that tracks where you want your company to go. The Company Vision Statement is shared with all employees. A Vision is defined as 'An Image of the future we seek to create'.

A Mission is defined as 'Purpose, reason for being'. Defined simply "Who we are and what we do". So the Mission statement does not cover where you are going or where you want to take your company.

Vision Statements are difficult to write - they should short (100 words or less), clear, vivid, inspiring and concise without using jargon, complicated words or concepts. Successful Statements are memorable and engaging. Some companies will combine their Mission and Vision Statements into one. That becomes very confusing.

What should go into your Company Vision Statement? Here are a few ideas on what you can include in a Vision Statement. Remember, it needs to be short – 100 words or less.

• What market position do you want to achieve? Biggest in your market, the best in the market
  

• What does the company do or what do you want your company business to be? IT Consulting, Menswear, Transportation
  

• What markets do you want to do business in? Global, North America, Region, City
  

• Do you focus on any particular market segment? Business owners, Retail companies, Females, Elderly
  

• How do you want to treat your stakeholders, (customers, employees, vendors, etc.)? Open book management, Treat as a partner, Customer is always right, etc.
  

• Corporate culture. Welcomes and initiates change, Creativity-Innovation, Strong Teamwork
  

• You can add a mission if you have one (but as I mentioned that can get confusing). We do it right the first time at a great price

Writing your Company Vision Statement is important! I encourage you to work on it with your management team or other key stakeholders. Without a clear Vision Statement that everybody understands how do you know where you are going? Typically you don’t and you end up coming in with a different idea every week that you are sure will help you succeed. Planning is critical and without a written Vision Statement it is hard to put effective plans in place.

Share your Company Vision Statement by commenting on this post.

A Recovery - Statistics Aren't Everything

The government is releasing statistics and starting to talk of the recession ending. It won’t be feeling like a recovery for many people. These sentiments were echoed in an editorial in the Washington Post. 2010 will still be difficult but there are opportunities too!

As business leaders this is a critical time for you. Regardless of whether you are making a profit now or if you are bleeding red ink you need to do some planning. This is the time to put plans in place for operating your business in an “unstable” environment.

Sit down and put together scenarios that show what happens if your revenues drop significantly. Look at revenue decreases that range from 35%-75%. Based on these scenarios you can then put plans/options in place to help you and your team manage through these uncertain times. You need cash to operate your business. Know how much you need. Getting any kind of financing now is extraordinarily difficult. Money just isn’t flowing from banks, etc. You have to find private funding but that comes with its own set of pitfalls. So do what you can with what you have. Look where else you can cut – people, products, benefits, etc. What else can you do to bring in additional revenues? Ask yourself all of the hard questions!

If you aren’t in the black now, do everything you possibly can to get back to positive. It’s ironic; companies that have seen decreases in revenues are now operating where they were a few years back. One clients business has dropped from over $4M to $2M. Of course, when they were at $2M they were thrilled. Now they have to go back to being able to operate successfully back at the $2M level.

I had one of my clients go through the process of identifying the various options available to them should sales drop significantly. They put “triggers” in place that set in motion certain activities should sales drop below pre-defined levels. The questions you have to answer include - what does it take to run your business, how much do you have to make in order to operate your business, and at what point do you shut the doors?

The environment will remain challenging for some time. Figure out what you need to do to operate successfully in unstable conditions.